


Mirrored Beams (and Doglike Stretch)

by Lizardbitch



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Scott, Alternate Universe - BDSM, Beta Derek Hale, Domestic Discipline, Drug Use, Emissary Stiles Stilinski, M/M, Panic Attacks, Recreational Drug Use, Spanking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-13
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:40:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22700371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lizardbitch/pseuds/Lizardbitch
Summary: Jackson moves back to California for college. It takes three whole years for him to run into anyone from Beacon Hills.Or"Oh my God they were roommates"
Relationships: Stiles Stilinski/Jackson Whittemore
Comments: 28
Kudos: 156





	1. August

**Author's Note:**

> First fic in over a decade. 
> 
> I'd feel bad about playing fast and loose with cannon if Jeff Davis had ever given us anything that made a lick of sense. 
> 
> Some suspension of disbelief i.e. west coast lacrosse divisions and schedules required

After finishing his Senior year of education in London, Jackson had applied exclusively to colleges in the US. That all of the schools were in California, he told himself, was because of the promise of good weather and good universities, and not, he sternly reminded his wolf, because they were doing anything as sentimental as “going home.” 

He’d applied to a wide range of colleges, and then, in a fit of rebellion that surprised even himself, settled on a middle of the road state school in the middle of LA county. His parents were coldly furious, but not even the weight of their disappointment was enough to make him go to any of the better schools he had gotten into farther north. Anywhere he might run into anyone from the Beacon Hills pack. 

Three years later and he only has one more year to go on his business degree. One more year and he’ll be done with college and back in his parents’ good graces, he hopes. He’ll get a loan from his dad and open...some kind of business. He isn’t too worried about it. He figures, you know, life goes on, you go through the motions, eventually you feel better. Eventually you stop having dreams where you’re a fucking lizard. Hopefully.

He’s moved back onto campus early, for lacrosse, and the emptiness of the dorms is as refreshing as it always is without the typical college miasma- burnt popcorn and sex and stress and unwashed sheets. He’s unpacked everything, organized it, and made a list of the books he’ll need this semester. There is nothing left to do. The quiet is nice, but he’s been too still for too long.

He needs to go on a run, he decides, but if he leaves now he’ll run until he can’t anymore, and then he’ll be shit at lacrosse practice tonight. The itchiness in his extremities has him starting a text to his dealer before he remembers that Chad, super senior moron that he was, finally graduated last year. Fuck. He's going to have to wait for that jittery kid from last year's chem lecture to get back on campus. Ming? He should be fine until then. He’s going to have to be.

He tries to focus on re-checking his class schedule for the fall semester. With only sixteen hours needed until graduation, and only 2 more required classes for his major, Jackson can dick around his senior year. He’d overloaded himself as an underclassman specifically to have a kick ass schedule this year, back when he thought college would be different -- so he does his best to ignore the blood rushing in his ears as he looks at all the empty space, free time, alone time he’ll have this semester. 

He closes his laptop and breathes until he can’t feel his heartbeat in his chest anymore. 

“This year is going to be awesome,” he says out loud. He sits and breathes until the stillness becomes unbearable, then grabs his sports bag and heads to the gym. There, at least, the cardio machines have a half hour limit, and it’ll be harder to work himself to exhaustion. 

……

He manages dinner between the gym and practice, but just barely. He gives coach everything he asks for and more for the whole three hours. Going hard enough on the field means he’ll be tired enough to sleep tonight, so he runs himself ragged. 

Compared to Beacon Hills, the university's lacrosse program is a cakewalk. This is his third year wearing the captain’s jersey, and sometimes just letting the weight of that accomplishment settle in his bones is all he needs to get through a shit day. The captaincy would be more impressive if he were actually playing on a Division I team, but Jackson is learning to take what he can get these days, especially because he can’t put his all into the sport, not like before. 

Jackson is the only wolf on the team, but he knows he’d be the best either way, lycanthropy or not. Some might call it cheating, but for Jackson, cheating has always been an acceptable path to victory. An honorable defeat is still a defeat, after all, and Jackson is a winner. He’s never suffered any moral dilemmas around competing with his supernatural advantages. 

But his wolf doesn’t share his iron will and self discipline, and shifts to the forefront whenever Jackson’s heart rate really elevates, when his focus narrows and he can taste the win - that’s when his bones and muscles and tendons scrape harshly against each other, rearranging themselves under his skin, and all of Jackson’s thoughts of glory become thoughts of blood, of the sharp crack of vertebrae under his teeth. 

So he comes to practice. He works hard. He gives great locker room speeches about leaving it all on the field. He doesn’t play as hard as he wants to. He keeps his distance from his teammates. 

He ends up turning down a teammate’s after-practice invitation that night to his frat’s welcome back mixer. Alcohol is not Jackson’s drug of choice. He has to drink damn near half a house’s liquor to feel even buzzed, and once he is he feels too loose, out of control, like he’ll definitely do something that he’ll regret. Something he can’t take back. 

So he heads back to the dorms instead, brushing against specific light poles and benches around his building. There are plenty of wolves on campus, most of them back early, like him, for football or track or cheerleading or marching band. Most of them are in a pack, either with each other or one back home. As an omega, Jackson has to mark the places he needs to be his. The other wolves aren’t malicious, but they are wolves. Territorial. 

Once he’s back in his room, in bed and still gross from practice, he eyes the bare extra long twin bed on the other side of the room. Every year he requests single. Every year he gets a roommate. He’s used to it, having learned that furious calls to the Housing Office make absolutely no difference.The rest of the students are due back tomorrow, so he’ll supposedly meet the other Dom then. As long as they’re quiet and relatively neat, they’ll be better than Jackson’s last 3 roommates. 

Doms, in Jackson’s experience, tend to conform to stereotype when forced into proximity. Jackson knows he has a tendency toward _asshole_ on a good day, but most of the Doms he's acquainted with manage to pin the needle on the absolute raging dick scale. 

His last roommate liked to bring subs back in the middle of the afternoon and leave the door unlocked for Jackson to walk in on them. More than once he’d come back to find a shivering, naked sub hogtied on the bed, to the desk, and once, memorably, in the shower. But what was he going to say to the guy? Fuck less? Not when he already has a reputation for being uptight.

It's been years since Jackson has taken a sub. There was Lydia all through high school, but even back then they both knew deep down that she wasn't really a sub, and even though she hasn't officially told him, he knows she's currently registered as a Domme. 

(He isn’t worried about gay jokes. What Dom wouldn’t be at least a little bit gay for Lydia Martin?)

After Lydia there were a couple of one night stands freshman year that he can barely remember. Nothing since then. It's been one hell of a dry spell, by most people's standards. But, in all honesty, Jackson doesn't think about sex that often. He finds the idea of it tedious. _Stand like this, kneel like that, don’t talk, suck my cock._ After Lydia’s calm confidence, everything else seems like too many steps just to get his dick wet. So he watches porn when he needs to and doesn’t worry about it the rest of the time.

Tomorrow is the last day before classes start, and it’s going to be a busy one. Coach set up a pre-dawn practice, and then Jackson has to go by the bookstore and his advisor’s office and Target before afternoon practice, and then there’s some mandatory team bonding. Hopefully by the time all of that is over his roommate will be totally moved in, and Jackson won’t have to hover awkwardly while they unpack. And maybe, just maybe, this one will have some fucking semblance of chill.

…...

Sweating and sore from the afternoon’s practice, Jackson barely makes it inside his building before he smells Stilinski. He hasn’t seen McCall’s right hand man since moving to London and back, might not have even recognized him on sight, but scent memory is a bitch and there’s no mistaking the smell for anyone else - rust and stale water, still tinged with the acrid ozone of amphetamine salts. 

Jackson’s metaphorical hackles rise as his literal claws unsheathe, discomfort growing as Stiles’ scent only intensifies the closer he gets to his dorm room. He’s going to panic if he isn’t careful, and Ming from chem hasn’t answered any of his texts yet, so there will be nothing for it. Slipping into the hall bathroom a few doors down from his room, Jackson forces himself to calm down, breathing as slowly as he can and waiting for his heart rate to get with the program. After a few splashes of cold water on his face, he feels like he can think again. 

There’s no reason to assume that Stilinski is here with any sinister intent, or that he’s even here because of Jackson at all, he tells himself. The remainder of the student body should be arriving today, and despite Stilinski’s inherent obnoxiousness, he’d always been an extroverted little loser. Maybe he knows someone here from some nerd camp and is helping them move in before he has to go back to Stanford or Berkeley or wherever the fuck. 

No need for a high school reunion any time soon, Jackson decides. He’ll just make himself scarce until later tonight. It’s not like he’s in any rush to meet his roommate; he has all year to get to know the guy, and he hasn’t been to the gym yet today. He could use a couple of hours on the rowing machine. He can even shower in the team locker room when he’s done. By the time he gets back, Stilinski will be long gone, he’s sure.

….

The Stilinski stench hasn’t dissipated at all by the time Jackson arrives back at his dorm. If anything, it’s _settled in._ Territorial disputes aren’t Jackson’s favorite, but it looks like that’s the direction his night is heading. 

He should have just stayed in London, terrible weather and terrible food be damned. He could have taken it. He could have held out a little longer against his wolf’s pathetic scrabbling toward California, and home, and _pack._

He braces himself as he opens the door, and sure enough, there’s Stilinski, sprawled out on the bed farthest from the door, eyes glued to his laptop. He looks different - longer hair, fuller frame - but Jackson thinks he would have recognized him.

Stiles raises his hand in greeting without looking up from his Macbook.

“Hey roomie, good to finally meet you. I’m Stiles.” 

_No_ , Jackson thinks. 

“No,” Jackson says. 

“No?” Stilinski starts, and then, finally looking up, “Holy shit, it’s Jackson Whittemore.” 

He slams his computer shut and jumps off the bed with only minimal flailing and settles into an awkward lean against the lofted bunk. 

Jackson crosses his arms and glares; says nothing. 

Still not great with silence, apparently, Stilinski lets only a couple of beats pass before deciding to take the small talk route. 

“It’s uh...it’s been a while man. How’ve you been? You look...well.” He gestures vaguely at Jackson’s entire body, now in sweats and a t-shirt and damp from the shower.

In the face of Jackson’s glaring silence, Stilinski bravely continues. 

“I knew Lydia said you were back in California, but, I mean, what are the odds, huh?” He grins weakly. “Um. Go Spartans?”

Jackson wants to scream. He wants the floor to open up and swallow him whole. He wants to wake up from what is clearly a stress dream. He wants, he wants, he wants. Like that’s ever mattered. 

“What,” Jackson grits out, “the fuck are you doing here? Is McCall with you?” 

Stilinski raises both hands in supplication. “It’s cool man, it’s cool. I go here.” At Jackson’s dubious look he adds, “Really. I transferred this year.”

“And McCall? Derek? The rest of the Scooby gang?”

“Just me dude. Really. Scott and Derek are still in Beacon Hills. Everyone else is close to them. It’s just me here, I promise.”

Jackson has several more questions, but he stops for a moment and listens to Stilinski’s heart beat. It’s a little fast, what with the adderall and the obvious surprise of _having Jackson for a roommate, Jesus Christ_ , but it’s steady. He isn’t lying. 

Pinching the bridge of his nose, Jackson sits down at his desk, trying to make sense of the utter insanity that is his life at the moment. He’d requested a single this year, but he had been prepared, just like every other year, to deal with a roommate, another hormone-fuelled jock of a Dom more than willing to give a silent and seething Jackson his space. Which, speaking of….

“This isn’t co-ed housing,” Jackson says. 

Stilinski blinks at him. When Jackson says nothing, he ventures, “I mean...yeah. On the housing form I said I’d be ok with co-ed, but I didn’t specifically request it or anything, so it’s not like I was expecting --” he stops. “Why are we talking about co-ed housing?”

“Because you’re a sub?” 

Stilinski goes tense and _still_ in a way Jackson’s never seen before, his face smoothing out briefly into an inscrutable mask. Whatever it is, though, he puts it away fast. If not for the lingering, bitter smell of a cortisol spike, Jackson would have thought he’d imagined it. When Stiles speaks again, it’s softer. 

“It really has been a long time, hasn’t it?” He runs his hands through his hair, pushing it back. “Anyways, yeah, no. I’m not a sub. I requested a re-test a couple of years ago. I’m a switch,” he says with sad-looking jazz hands. “Dom-leaning.” 

For some reason this pisses Jackson off more than anything else about this entire situation. He stepped into his dorm tonight ready for a fight, and it doesn’t take much for his adrenaline to kick back up. Stilinski of all people, a Dom. As if the squirrely, eager-to-please little kid he remembers shoving into the sandbox could ever get someone on their knees for him. As if Stilinski deserves to have someone call him sir. And to stand there and look disappointed, of all things? 

Fuck him.

“Fuck you,” Jackson says. 

“Man, what the _hell_ -” is the last thing he lets himself hear before he slams the door shut on his way out. No way is he going to room with Stilinski the whole year. No way. 

…..

After a week of classes and practice, Jackson still hasn't found time to make it to the housing office and request a dorm change. And Stilinski is, amazingly, both neat and quiet. Jackson hardly ever sees him. He comes back to the room at night after Jackson is asleep and is still passed out when Jackson leaves for practice in the morning. He's smelled him around the library, so he figures Stilinski has holed himself up there. A little early in the semester, even for most nerds, but Jackson isn't complaining. 

And it doesn’t hurt to have a roommate who already knows about the supernatural. He isn’t going to wonder about where Jackson disappears off to once a month. He isn’t going to ask about his ripped up shirts and sheets. It’s possible that Jackson may have overreacted to the whole...sharing space with Stilinski thing. 

A few nights later Stiles gets back to the room at his usual ungodly hour, but Jackson happens to be awake. He’d love to be able to fall asleep, but Ming, that little shit, had finally come through this evening, so he’ll be awake until morning, at least.

He’s using the time to finish his reading for his class on Monday. Insomnia isn’t his favorite side effect, but he’d needed _something_ after tonight’s absolutely dismal practice. The team just couldn’t seem to get it together, no matter how hard Jackson tried, and coach had laid into them about an hour in and then dismissed them, telling them to come back ready to practice the next day. 

The rest of the team got off the field in a hurry, but Jackson stayed and ran laps until he had to admit the burn in his lungs and legs wasn’t helping the black hole of _suck_ deep in his gut. Thus, the adderall. Once it wears off, he'll have to deal with the jagged edges of the comedown, but he’ll have paid the price of failing to live up to his own perfectionism, and the lead weight in his chest will be gone. He’s got a fridge full of high ABV beer for later, to ease him down into sobriety.

He takes one out of the fridge and takes a deep breath. 

“Hey Stilinski,” he calls out. Stiles looks up right away, expression friendly enough considering their last real conversation. 

Jackson holds the beer down low in an underhand grip, making it clear that he plans to toss it. Stiles grins and puts his hands up, ready to catch. The can makes a clean arc through the air and lands with a satisfying smack in Stilinski’s palms. He cracks it open and sucks down half of it immediately. 

“Thanks man,” he says, wiping beer foam from his mouth with the back of his hand. “That was exactly what I needed.” 

A frisson of heat runs down Jackson’s spine at the words. He scowls at the sensation and pointedly turns back to the article he was reading for class. 

“Don’t mention it,” he mutters. 

Stilinski must have learned some impulse control over the past few years, because he doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the night.


	2. September

When Jackson sits still for too long, his brain can get away from him. It’s like little pockets of fear are trapped in his body, waiting for him to let down his guard so they can escape, bubbling up and whispering _coward, coward_ all the way to the surface. So Jackson keeps moving. 

Some mornings he wakes up, fear pumping through him from dreams he can’t always remember. He sleeps in running shorts for just this reason. There are trails around campus, if the gym is still closed, and if it’s early enough in the morning, Jackson can push his pace past “fit human” into “supernatural creature.” The closer he gets to his personal limits, the further away the bad thoughts are. 

One day, he’ll be able to outrun them for good. As long as he keeps getting better, faster, and closer to flawless, the panic won’t be able to touch him. Logically Jackson knows that perfection, while perhaps something to strive for, is not an attainable goal. Logically, he knows this. 

But somewhere deep in his hindbrain, Jackson also knows that if he can just push just that much farther, he’ll reach that shining, platinum standard, and be just that much ahead of everyone else. There will be nothing left to improve. And everyone who looks at him will know that he is worthy. 

He tries not to think about the only time he’s ever felt good enough for someone else in his entire life, or what that might mean - but he knows not every dream about the kanima is a nightmare. He wakes from those loose-limbed and heavy in his body, feeling as close to perfect as he ever has. 

He tries not to think about it. 

...

Jackson knows he isn’t an idiot, and that the semester has barely started, but Numerical Analysis, the last class he needs for his Statistics minor, is ruining his entire life. Everything makes sense in class, but when he tries to apply what he’s learned on his homework the answers are never even remotely correct, no matter how closely he follows his notes. There’s no one he knows well enough to get the answers from. 

He knows there’s a help lab in the afternoon and early evening during the week, but he’s never needed help outside of the classroom and he isn’t going to start now. Combined with the pressure of a failed test yesterday and losing their first 2 lacrosse games and the full moon later this week and the essay due tomorrow that he hasn’t even started, Jackson doesn’t remember ever being this high strung in his life. 

It’s just his luck that Stilinski is in the room when he snaps. 

He’s scrambling to finish his homework before class starts. He has an hour. He isn’t going to finish in time. If he can’t pull off at least a B in this class his GPA will drop below a 3.5 and his parents will stop funding his education. He won’t be able to graduate this year and then everyone will know what a failure he is and oh god his parents...

Before he knows what’s happening his breath is coming in gasps, shallow and rapid. Fuck. He isn’t getting enough air. He isn’t pulling in enough oxygen and it’s going to kill him. He’s going to die. He’s going to die and Stilinski is going to wake up mid-afternoon to find a dead Jackson slumped over in his chair. 

But the universe has had it out for him since his sophomore year of high school, so Stilinski wakes up and makes direct eye contact just in time to bear witness to his panic attack. Squeezing his eyes shut, Jackson blocks out the sickening rush of tunnel vision. He grips the edge of his desk in an effort to ground himself. This sucks so bad.

From the darkness behind his eyelids he hears Stilinski half fall off of his bed, then nothing, and then suddenly there is the warm, grounding pressure of hands on his thighs. 

“You don’t have to open your eyes Jackson, but you do have to slow your breathing down,” Stilinski tells him. His voice is low, and calm, and manages somehow to temper the dangerous, brittle edges of impending doom in his chest. 

Jackson manages two deep lungfuls before he’s panting again, ribs aching with the effort. 

“No, slower. With me.” Stiles gently prises Jackson’s fingers from his desk and puts Jackson’s hands on his shoulders. “Feel me breathe. Match it.” 

Jackson opens his eyes enough to see Stilinski on his knees in front of him, and that sends another roil of nausea through his guts. He slams his eyes shut again and tries to focus on the rise and fall of Stilinski’s shoulders.

“That’s it buddy. You’re doing really well,” Stiles says, after Jackson has moved on to shaky, barely controlled gulps of air. “Go slower on the exhale.”

It feels so good to be doing something right, even if it’s just breathing, that he lets himself float a little. Time passes. He has things to worry about, he knows, but they all seem so far away right now. He sits and breathes with Stilinski up until he remembers, groggily -- “I’ve got class soon.” 

“You’re not going to class today,” Stiles tells him. “We’ll email the professor and let them know what’s going on. There’s nothing you need to worry about right now.” 

It’s exactly what Jackson wants to hear. But there’s something different about Stilinski’s voice, like an added level of reverberation that isn’t there when Stiles asks him if it’s ok to keep the light on at night or if Jackson wants anything from the cafeteria. He can’t place it at first, and then an immediate, terrifying rage flushes through him and burns out any calm he may have achieved.

He stands up, prompting Stilinski to scramble to his feet as well. 

“Don’t you ever fucking do that to me again,” he says, voice flat and hard enough that he barely recognizes it. 

Stilinski looks confused for a moment, but confusion quickly gives way to irritation.

“Literally what are you talking about?” His hands are flailing over his head; he’s conveying every emotion with his whole being, and this is the Stiles Stilinski Jackson remembers. “I pulled you out of a panic attack. You’re welcome, you fucking douche-bag.” But his eyes are shifty, and the sour tang of guilt is starting to permeate of off him. He knows what he fucking did. 

Jackson hadn’t known that he was itching for a fight, but god, he can feel it now, scratching under his skin like the prickle of fur right before a full shift. Stiles’ eyes are bright and a flush is working its way up his neck, and where does he get off, being so angry? 

“You were trying to top me, I heard you,” Jackson spits. “You think just because you’re some big bad Dom now that you can go around compelling anyone? In case you forgot, asshole, I’m a Dom too. That shit won’t work on me.”

“Compel…compelling...are you serious right now?” Stiles pinches the bridge of his nose and looks heavenward. 

“There’s actually a mega-ton of shit to unpack about what you just said, but we’ll start with this. You know I can’t compel you, right? I can’t compel anyone.” His eyes narrow and his voice gets sharper, saturated with a mean-spirited condescension Jackson hadn’t known Stilinski was capable of. “There’s no such thing as...as...compelling! Which you should know, by the way. When’s the last time you “compelled” someone?” 

The more Stilinski stresses the word compel at him the stupider he feels, anger draining rapidly and the harsh sting of fucking tears springing up behind his eyes and his stupid, animal brain latches onto the feeling like a leech, reminding him that only a few moments ago he had been in the middle of a panic attack. He surreptitiously tries to find the easy in-and-out rhythm from earlier -- slow inhale and slower exhale. Stiles notices right away.

“You idiot,” he says, but the venom is gone from his voice, and he looks more apologetic than anything else. “Let’s go sit down and get you taken care of.” He leads Jackson over to the futon under his lofted bunk, sits down first and pats the spot next to him. Jackson sits as far away as possible.

“Keep breathing and just listen,” Stiles tells him. “I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable. If I came across toppy at all --” he starts, awkwardly, and suddenly Jackson doesn’t want to hear it. 

“Don’t worry about it, Stilinski,” he says. “Just don’t tell me what to do.” 

Stiles snorts. “Ok, I won’t apologize. It was going to be half-assed at best anyway. But I do want to remind you that I’m not a Dom. I’m a switch.”

“Dom, switch,” Jackson shrugs, “doesn’t matter. They’re the same thing.” 

Stilinski’s eyes narrow. “Don’t be a bigot, man. They’re not.” 

“No, I mean like, if you’re a switch, why would you sub?” He tries to clarify. 

“Me personally? Why would I, personally, choose to sub?”

Jackson had meant more of the general “you,” but now he can’t help but wonder what it would take to get Stilinski on his knees. “You, anybody, whatever. Why choose to live like that if you could live life as a Dom?”

“Again,” Stiles says, “I’m not living life as a Dom, because I’m not a Dom. I’m a switch. I prefer to top, but not all of us do.”

“Ok, Jesus. Why do you sub?”

The bridge of Stilinski’s nose and the tips of his ears flush a light pink, and Jackson is assaulted with the too-sweet, cotton candy stench of embarrassment. He grins wolfishly, just to see him flush darker. 

“If you must know,” Stiles says primly, “I really only sub for Scott. It’s a pack thing.”

Jackson feels his eyes widen. “You, and McCall…?” He makes a lewd hand gesture and is rewarded with a squawk of indignation. 

“God, no. No. Nope. Negative, Ghost Rider. We have never,” Stilinski assures him. “It isn’t like that at all.”

“Then what is it like?” 

Stiles shoots him a look, but answers easily enough. “He’s my alpha. I’m accountable to him, just like everyone in the pack is.”

“Even other Doms?”

“He’s the alpha,” Stilinski repeats, like that explains everything. “Is it...is it not like that in your pack?” He asks it too casually, and Jackson picks up the faint diesel smoke smell of someone straining to not show all of their cards. 

Stiles is fishing for information, and badly. Jackson would tell him where to stick it, except for how his wolf had perked up at the mention of McCall’s pack, his pack, according to the miserable creature inside him. He doesn’t want to think about it or why that might be. 

“Let’s not,” he says after a moment. 

“Cool man, yeah. No worries,” Stiles shrugs, easy. “Not my business anyway.” He turns to face Jackson more fully on the futon. “Something I am worried about, though, is your apparently dismal grasp of sex education. Were you one of those weird kids whose parents signed them out of Health for that unit?” 

“I went to sex ed, Stilinski,” Jackson answers, dryly. 

“So you must know that compelling is -”

“A myth, yeah,” Jackson cuts him off. “I remember.”

“Great,” Stilinski claps his hands together. “So no need for a refresher course.” 

“Nope, definitely not.” 

“So do you want to tell me what caused your panic attack this morning?”

Jackson does not. He looks at his watch. 

“I need to get to class,” he says.

“I thought you weren’t going to class today?”

“I thought you weren’t telling me what to do,” Jackson responds flatly. Stilinski mimes locking his mouth shut and throwing away the key, then bows elaborately at the door, ushering him out of the room. 

Jackson makes sure he’s halfway down the hall before he smiles. 

….

Full moons in the expansive urban sprawl outside of L.A. had taken some getting used to. Attitudes toward omegas in the UK had been different, in that no one gave a shit. As long as a lone wolf didn’t threaten an established pack or its territory, or any humans, hunters and other wolves were content to live and let live. 

Here, Jackson has learned, you’re just as likely to be hunted down as you are to be conscripted into a turf war. After several bad full moon experiences, Jackson has taken to driving to the coast the day of, hiking out to the remotest beach he can find, and spending the moon digging and howling and catching fish. 

He likes to swim out as far as he can and float, unafraid, the most dangerous thing in the water by far.

The first full moon of the school year is tomorrow, which happens to be a Sunday. He decides to drive out a day early, spend a night under the stars in his own skin. The more time he spends with Stilinski the more he feels as if he’s unraveling. It’s been years since Jackson’s been around anyone who knows him, much less anyone who knows exactly what he’s been through. He’s been in literal mortal peril in the same room as Stilinski more than once. More than twice, maybe.

They haven’t talked about any of it in the past 3 weeks. Not that they haven’t talked about high school, or Beacon Hills - mostly about what old teammates are up to now, if Jackson remembered that epic food fight and did he know Stiles started it, that one time Greenberg called Coach “mom.” 

But they aren’t ignoring it, either. There is no awkward talking around it, as if the mere mention of the shit they had been through would crack either of them. Stiles doesn’t make any effort to hide the baseball bat he keeps by his bed, or try to pretend that it isn’t magically infused with wolfsbane and mountain ash. 

(“You aren’t going to want to touch that,” Stiles tells Jackson when he catches him inspecting it. Jackson wasn’t planning on it. The poison-soaked wood smells terrible and is nauseating up close. 

But Stilinski telling him what to do has been a trigger ever since that humiliating panic attack the other morning, and now Jackson has the strangest urge to do the exact opposite of whatever he says. This time isn’t different. 

He comes to on the floor with Stilinski standing over him, grinning, bat that he must have reappropriated from Jackson slung over his shoulder. “You’re fucking crazy, man,” he laughs, and helps Jackson to his feet).

He needs to clear his head, go climb some cliffs by the ocean, something. The more time he spends with Stiles the more he finds himself wanting to talk about Beacon Hills and the number of times they almost died. And if that starts coming up, who knows what else might?

He doesn’t pack a bag for his full moon trips, just makes sure there’s a change of clothes in the Porsche and some wolf-proof snacks - oranges, peanuts, other things his wolf isn’t interested in. He’s ready to walk out the door when he sees Stiles, passed out on his futon in the middle of day as usual, and, otherwise unprompted, his brain asks, hey, should we maybe leave a note for Stilinski? 

Which, no. Jackson is not a 50-year old sub, so he won’t leave anything as ridiculous as a note. He has never, in his college history, told a roommate that he was going to be gone for a night or two. He didn’t care to tell them and they didn’t care to know. 

But Stilinski...might worry. And the last thing he needs is for someone who personally knows his parents to worry about him. So he takes out his phone and sends a car, a moon, and a wolf emoji. He listens until Stilinski’s phone buzzes softly on the nightstand, and then heads toward the beach. Halfway there he gets a text, a single thumbs up from Stiles. Which - great. That handles that, then. 

…

He gets back just in time for lacrosse practice on Monday. The full moon wears him out, but not like it used to. He still has plenty of energy to yell at his team while making them do wind sprints. They’re going to make it to the playoffs this year, even if he has to drag his team kicking and screaming. They aren’t terrible players, his teammates, but they lack the dedication necessary to improve. 

That’s ok. Jackson has the rest of the year to get them into shape. And at least they seem to have a dedicated supporter this year. 

Stilinski comes to his lacrosse games. Not the ones scheduled before noon, but he’s at almost every evening and afternoon match. Jackson can hear him in the stands; he’s one of their more enthusiastic fans. He isn’t sure how Stilinski has the time. He’s seen the man’s course load - his semester’s schedule is taped to the wall by his bed. It doesn’t look like he has a minute to spare. 

It means he’s had to look up the lacrosse schedule, maybe move things around in order to make certain games, and that thought twists at Jackson’s guts, for some reason.

When he’s there he calls out Jackson’s jersey number loud enough that he can remember what it felt like to be a star, to have everyone looking at him. Lacrosse isn’t something he can take seriously anymore, and they win only slightly more than they lose, but the recognition feels nice anyway. 

It’s not something they’ve ever talked about, Stilinski being at his games, but Jackson has never been very good at saying thank you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jackson "I don't want to talk about it" Whittemore, everyone


	3. October

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quarantine, am I right?

There is a bar close to campus with enough Jager and Redbull to keep the college crowd satisfied and enough craft beer on tap to appeal to townie hipsters. It isn’t a pick up bar, but it isn’t exactly not a pick up bar either. Jackson comes in once a week or so to show off at pool and have a drink. The lacrosse team has started coming in too, presumably due to its proximity to campus, so there’s almost always someone there who he knows. But not tonight.

Jackson isn’t unaware of the eyes on him. He doesn't necessarily mind the attention, even though he’s never going to go home with any of these people. There’s a group of submissive women at a table watching him shamelessly. He flashes a smile their way, and can’t help but notice how one girl’s expensive looking sub bands refract the dim overhead lights as her hands flutter around her face. Pretty. She plays with her hair, pulling it away from her bare neck, wrapping it around her fist and tugging suggestively. Jackson goes back to his pool game. 

He’s about to sink the 8 when the smell of rust and stale water wafts over from the bar. Stilinski. He represses an embarrassing urge to scrunch down behind the pool table. There’s no reason to hide, especially not in what he’s come to consider “his” bar. If Stilinski sees him and comes over, fine. He can be sociable. Otherwise, Jackson will leave him to his own devices. 

He takes a deep breath and aims for the left side pocket - misses, watches the 8 ricochet flawlessly into the right corner instead. 

Not good enough. He racks the balls for another game. 

Stilinski, not that Jackson is watching him, seems to be drinking alone. This bar isn’t picky about fakes, and those are easy enough to come by. He overhears Stilinski order a Rolling Rock (weird fucking choice) and then forces himself to focus on breaking. 

The crack of the cue is loud against the dense triangle of racked balls, and solids and stripes alike separate beautifully. Stripes first, he decides, then sets himself to sinking ball after ball with brutal efficiency, no trick shots allowed after losing the last game, that’s the rule. 

The focus is nice, and he slips into a quiet headspace where the world falls away and the only thing that matters is the next shot. When it comes down to the 8 he knows it’s going in the pocket he called as soon as the stick connects. Perfect game. 

The sounds of the bar slowly filter back in. The table of submissive girls has moved on to new hunting grounds, no one from the lacrosse team has shown up, but Stilinski is still at the bar, no longer drinking alone. A large, much older Dominant man has settled in next to him, and seems to be in the middle of ordering Stiles another Rolling Rock, which Stiles then accepts. 

“I haven’t seen you here before. You must be new in town,” the man says to Stiles. His accent is thick and southeastern - Texan, maybe.  
“Transferred this year,” Stiles answers, mirroring the man’s body language, open and inviting. “Go Spartans.” Jackson doesn’t necessarily mean to eavesdrop; he couldn’t care less what Stilinski gets up to in his free time. Werewolf superpowers - a blessing and a curse. 

“Oh, a college boy. I like that.” The Dom gives Stiles an obvious once over, then gets the bartender’s attention and gestures to his empty shot glass, holding up two fingers. “You drink whiskey, college boy?” The shots practically materialize in front of them. Daddy Dom over there must be shelling out for the good stuff. 

“I do,” Stiles answers after he smoothly takes the shot of amber liquor. He takes a sip of his beer as a chaser before sweetly asking, “So is it the 30 year age gap that turns your crank, or do you just have something for coeds?”

The Dom is thrown off his rhythm, but only for a second. The smile he gives Stilinski is downright predatory.

“Smart mouth, I like that too,” he drawls. “Not even wearing any bands. You’re one of those progressive subs, aren’t you?” He leans in close and wraps the fingers of his right hand around Stilinski’s left wrist -- an invitation. 

Jackson goes cold. There are plenty of subs here tonight, and for this guy to head straight for Stilinski is...unsettling. No jewelry, short hair -- most people would clock Stiles as a top. Maybe there’s something about him that Jackson can’t see, something that sets him apart as a switch. 

Stiles snatches his wrist back immediately and is now keeping it firmly palm down on his knee, but otherwise his expression hasn’t changed. “No thank you,” he says pleasantly. “Not interested.”

“A lot of boys have told me that, sweetheart. They all changed their minds.” The man smiles, and moves as if to reach for Stiles again. 

Jackson doesn’t remember crossing the length of the bar, but suddenly he’s pressed in close behind Stilinski. 

“He said he’s not interested, you mouth breathing hick. Fuck off.” 

The man meets Jackson’s glare for a moment - a beat passes - but then he laughs and holds up his hands. “Ok, youngblood, I see I've stepped on some toes. Might want to keep a better leash on this one-” he jerks his thumb in Stiles’ direction “- or you could end up losing track of him.” He ambles over to the end of the bar, presumably to try his luck elsewhere. What a creep. 

Sorry about him, Jackson wants to say, but he’s not sure what he would be apologizing for. It’s not like he knows the guy. He takes the man’s seat instead, only to come face to face with a furious Stilinski.

“Nobody asked you to do that,” he tells Jackson, and Jesus, his voice is like ice. What the fuck?

“It’s called a favor?” he says. “You’re welcome.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“No one said you couldn’t.” Seriously, what does he want Jackson to say to that? “It was uncomfortable to watch. I stepped in. That’s all that happened,” he tries. 

“So you decide to insert yourself in my business because watching a shitty Dom hit on me made you uncomfortable? That’s not a favor.”

“That’s a twisted fucking perspective, Stilinski. But I’ll be sure not to bother next time.”

“I can take care of myself,” Stilinski says again. 

“Ok,” says Jackson, and leaves. 

…

Jackson ends up at the gym, lifting weights mechanically, endlessly, until even his werewolf healing factor can’t keep pace with the lactic acid building up in his muscles. He grinds his teeth in triumph at the soreness settling into his pecs and quads. 

He had tried to get some class work done, first in the room and then in the library, but he couldn’t let go of the argument in the bar with Stilinski. He doesn’t think he did anything wrong, but Stilinski seemed convinced. In fact, Jackson thought it had been pretty fucking nice of him to run that creep off. It’s not like he wants a trophy for it or anything, but the immediate and targeted anger had thrown him. 

He doesn't want Stiles to be mad at him, is the conclusion he had been forced to come to.

So now he’s at the gym.

The resistance of heavy iron against tired muscle is a singular sensation. Jackson imagines his muscle fibers breaking down from the stress, only to be rebuilt stronger. Like everyone else, he dies a little on a cellular level every day, only to be gradually reborn. Jackson is not the person he was yesterday. He likes to think about that sometimes. 

He knows some might say he pushes himself too far, but he always knows exactly when to stop. When there’s nothing left but breath in his lungs and silence in his head, he’s done. 

…

It’s late, for him, when he gets back to the room. He isn’t expecting Stiles to be there, but he still feels a twinge of something like disappointment that he isn’t. 

Stiles isn’t there in the morning either. His scent on the other side of the room is starting to grow stale, so he hasn’t been in since yesterday morning, most likely. But, as was made abundantly clear to him yesterday, Stilinski can take care of himself. 

Jackson leaves his phone in the room when he leaves for class that afternoon. He won’t be able to live with himself if he spends all day checking for a text he has no reason to expect. He’s a lot of things, but pathetic isn’t one of them.

Stiles doesn’t come back to the room for a few days, his scent fading slowly but surely. Jackson knows he’s still on campus, having caught whiff of him around the library - and the engineering quad of all places - but he hasn’t seen him since he left the bar that night. He takes to keeping his phone in his drawer, telling himself it’s so he can concentrate more on studying, which isn’t even a lie. 

The full moon comes and goes. He picks up from Ming as soon as he gets back to campus and downs two adderall immediately. Amphetamines and the shift don’t mix at all, but they can help with recovery time after the fact. He chances turning his phone back on. Nothing from Stilinski, but at least now Jackson doesn’t have to feel bad about it. 

...

Stilinski must finally sneak back in one night while Jackson is sleeping, because around 3 in the morning he’s woken up by a god awful scream from the other side of the room. The lights are off, but Jackson has been able to see in the dark for years now.

He sees Stiles sitting straight up on his futon, sustaining a ragged scream that sounds absolutely horrified. Eyes unfocused, limbs stiff - guy must still be asleep. Jackson knows what that’s like. 

“Stilinski,” Jackson tries from across the room. “Stilinski, wake up.” The scream shuts off abruptly, only to be replaced by a soft litany of, _nononono_ , which is, somehow, worse. He isn’t sure what to do. Were you not supposed to wake up people in the middle of night terrors? Or was that sleepwalking? Shit.

But the last time he’d tried to help his roommate his efforts had been thrown back in his face. Stiles can deal with this on his own. 

Jackson has his running shoes in one hand and the door handle in the other, when Stiles shouts “No, please!” and then dissolves into tears, but doesn’t wake up. Ok then. There’s no way he can let the guy sleep through something like that.

“Stiles!” Jackson says loudly from beside him. “You’re dreaming. Wake up.” He reaches out to shake Stiles awake, but as soon as his hand makes contact his wrist is caught in a shockingly strong grip. 

Still, despite all the forearm curls Stilinski has apparently been doing in his spare time, it’s got nothing on werewolf strength, only as soon as Jackson moves to break free, something surges painfully through him and brings him to his knees.

His wolf comes snarling to the surface, only to slam into metaphorical steel bars. He can’t shift. 

Electricity, then. What the fuck? 

“Stiles,” he pleads, electric current ripping through him. “Let me go.” Stiles doesn’t.

“Please,” he adds in a whisper, desperate. 

And the current shuts off as though a switch were flipped. 

“Jackson?” Stiles’s voice is rough around the edges, tinged only slightly with fear.

“Yep,” says Jackson unhappily from the floor. He pushes himself up and flops down on the futon next to Stiles. “You weren’t fucking around about being able to take care of yourself. I _promise_ this is the last time I try to help you.”

“Oh god. I’m so...I cannot begin to tell you how sorry I am. Are you ok?”

“No,” Jackson pouts. “You lit me up like a Christmas tree, asshole. Have you always been able to do that?”

“I...no. Or, I didn’t always know how? It’s something, I’m, uh, _honing_ I guess.”

“Whatever. I’m poking you with a stick next time.”

Stiles laughs, a little wetly. “I thought you weren’t helping me anymore.” 

Jackson doesn’t say anything for a while, and the silence swells, heavy and full. He turns his head so that his face is inches away from Stilinski’s, watches as he squints to make out Jackson’s features in the scant light. The moment stretches, eventually the silence crests, breaking gently when Jackson asks, “Are you ok?”

“Yeah,” Stiles says, clearing his throat “Yeah, I’m ok. Thank you. For waking me up. Sorry again for electrocuting you. In my defense, I was asleep.”

Jackson snorts softly. “Ok, yeah. Try not to do it again.” He moves to get up and go back to bed, but Stilinski grabs his wrist again - no electricity this time. 

“I also want to apologize for the other day. In the bar,” Stiles says, “I was out of line. I’m sorry.”

Jackson isn’t sure he’s ever received such an uncomplicated apology. He’s not quite sure what to do with it. He wants to let it go.

“You seemed really mad,” he says instead. 

“I was,” Stiles admits, “But not at you. I took it out on you and I shouldn’t have. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

It must be late, because Jackson’s eyes sting a little at that. He clears his throat. “Don’t worry about it, Stilinski. We’re cool.” 

“Thanks,” Stilinski says. “I appreciate it.” He lets go of his wrist, but Jackson imagines he can feel the residual warmth there even as he climbs back into his own bed. He’s asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow.  
...

Midterm season is busy, but Jackson doesn’t mind the extra workload. Other than Numerical Analysis, which he’s dragged kicking and screaming up to a B-, he’s sitting pretty in the rest of his classes. 

Stiles is around, twitchy and staticky from too much adderall. 

“Do you really study better like that - all twacked out?” They’re in a reserved study room, courtesy of Stiles and his carefully cultivated relationships with library staff. 

“Probably not,” Stiles says without turning around from the white board. “But it makes me feel like the King of Studying, so maybe?”

Jackson had put down his Creative Writing essay an hour ago and has been watching Stilinski ever since. The meds have him laser focused and distractedly chatty by turn, and all Jackson has to do is nudge Stilinski in one conversational direction or another, and he can let the one-sided chatter wash over him, better than white noise for his brain. Listening to Stilinski wax poetic about medieval European politics while mapping an inferential statistics problem on the white board is an oddly peaceful experience. 

“You know you’re better than this place, right?” Jackson says without exactly meaning to. 

Stiles does stop writing then, hand frozen mid-air as he turns to look at Jackson. His hair is sticking out at all angles, and his forearms are covered in dry erase marker, him having decided to forgo the eraser for some reason. He grins and spits out the marker cap. 

“Aw, thanks Jax. Good thing I’m not actually here for their social science department then, huh?”

Jackson doesn’t take conversational bait and Stiles knows it. Of course he has questions about why Stilinski is here of all places, but he isn’t going to ask. He doesn’t need his roommate to think he cares about his life. 

He crosses his arms and maintains a bland expression.

Stiles winks and goes back to his statistics equation.  
...

Midterms are over, fall break is around the corner, and something is going on with Stilinski. The guy normally has a lot of energy, sure, but right now he seems to be practically vibrating. It is annoying as shit. 

“Could you be still, for like, 5 minutes? I’d settle for 2,” Jackson says. 

“You can leave, asshole.” Stiles gestures broadly toward the door. “There’s a whole campus and surrounding town. Knock yourself out.” 

But he does sit down at his desk, crossing his arms tightly across himself. Less than thirty seconds later he’s back up, rifling through his drawers, holding his laptop upside down and shaking it out, tossing clothes from his hamper onto the floor. 

Ok, so Jackson is curious now. “Looking for something?”

“Ah ha!” Stilinski shouts from under his futon, emerging with something orange and pill shaped held high between his thumb and index finger. He pops it in his mouth and swallows it dry, then his face falls dramatically. “Fucking...Altoid,” he says. 

Jackson suspects he knows what Stilinski is looking for. “You burn through your script a little fast this month?” 

Stiles whips his head around fast enough that Jackson experiences fleeting concern for his neck. He’s wide eyed and a little pale. He opens his mouth and an entire paragraph falls out.

“I don’t always take it on the weekends, you know, so I thought doubling up for midterms would be fine, but I think I went a little overboard last week? I’ve missed the past couple of days, which was gonna be fine ‘cause I thought my script would be ready tomorrow but it’s actually not gonna be up for refill for another 10 days or so and I might be freaking out a little and Scott is going to be so....” Stiles drops his hands to his sides and looks as hopeless as Jackson has ever seen him.

Jackson holds up a hand. Stilinski has been irritating the hell out of him all morning, and seeing him this distressed is actually making Jackson’s heart rate kick up a notch, so his voice is sharp when he replies - “It was a yes or no question Stilinski. I wasn’t asking for a fucking play by play.” 

Stilinski wilts at his harsh tone, whines a little as he sinks to his futon and presses the heels of his hands into his eyes, which makes Jackson feel like an entire asshole. He looks over to his desk drawer where he’s stashed his supply. He’s got maybe about 10 days worth, but that’ll clear him out and Ming is nowhere near as reliable as Chad had been. Fuck.

He retrieves the illicit pills from his desk and squats in front of Stiles, shaking them in their hidey-hole of an ibuprofen bottle. He sighs deeply. “These should get you through. You owe me.”

Stiles looks up and takes the bottle from him, opens it up to inspect its contents. “You take these to study?”

Jackson shrugs. “Sometimes. Usually not.” It’s not any of Stilinski’s business, really, what he uses them for. 

“Thank you.” It’s softly spoken, almost inaudible, but Jackson thinks he’d be able to pinpoint Stiles’ whisper in a crowd, these days. 

…

At first the Adderall seems to have helped, but over the next few days Stilinski’s mood worsens. He’s snappy and irritable and on edge, startle point worn down to nothing, jumping at every unexpected sound. It could be withdrawal; he wouldn’t know. Jackson’s never taken anything consistently enough to have a hard time coming off of it. He, bizarrely, finds himself wanting to help.

“Come for a run with me,” he says to Stilinski the day before fall break, just as the gray of dawn is submitting to the soft colors of morning. Stilinski doesn’t look like he’s slept at all. A run certainly wouldn’t kill him. 

Stiles looks down at him from his lofted bunk, eyes bleary and slitted, and laughs once, humorlessly. “No way wolfman. I don’t need you mocking my feeble human attempts at exercise. At least not before breakfast.” 

“I’d pace to you,” Jackson tries, even though he isn’t sure why. “We don’t have to go very far. Just around campus.” 

“Yeah. Thanks but no thanks,” Stilinski says, and then rolls over and pretends to sleep. 

Jackson, already dressed for a jog, heads out and closes the door softly behind him.

…

Stiliniski doesn’t seem to be doing much better the next day either. His hormones are all over the place, and Jackson has no idea what’s going on with him other than that he smells terrible. 

“Stilinski, you think you’re gonna be able to wrap up this pity party any time soon? You’re stinking up the room.” 

What sounds like a very muffled “fuck off” comes from the tight cocoon of blankets on the other bed. 

“If I do, is it going to smell any better when I come back?” A loud, sustained groan is his only answer. “Yeah, I thought so. Seriously, what is going on with you?”

There’s some wiggling inside the cocoon, and then Stilinski’s head is free, and he somehow looks worse than he smells, eyes red and puffy, skin tinged yellow and broken out, hair stringy from grease. And if looks could kill, Jackson would be a dead man. 

“You’re either an asshole or a moron,” Stilinksi tells him.

“Are you sick or something?”

“A moron then,” Stiles decides as he burrows back into his blankets. 

“Don’t be shitty. I can’t help if you don’t tell me what’s going on.”

“Oh, is that what you’re doing? Helping?”

“I would be if you stopped being a total dick for 5 minutes.”

Jackson doesn’t get a response to that one. He could leave, he supposes, head out to the student union or go for a run, get the team members still on campus together for a quick scrimmage. But as terrible company as Stilinski is right now, Jackson is hesitant to leave him. He’s got this nagging sensation that there’s something seriously wrong. So he stays. 

...

Stiles doesn’t move for most of the day but manages to startle the hell out of Jackson when he throws back his covers and jumps down from his bed. He doesn’t say anything, just grabs a towel, a change of clothes, and his shower caddy. Great. A shower definitely won’t hurt. 

…

It’s either very late at night or very early in the morning when Stiles makes it back to the room. He’s limping. He smells better. 

Jackson flips on the light, making Stiles jump and swear softly. His neck and wrists, Jackson notices, are covered in dark bruises. There are a million things he could say. 

“I thought you only subbed for Scott?” is what he goes with.

Stiles shrugs roughly. “Desperate times.” 

Jackson isn’t sure what that means. Those bruises look like they hurt. “Do you..need to still be in pain?”

Stiles laughs, the sound clearer than it’s been for days. “Not if you’re offering to take it away, no.” 

Jackson sticks his hand out from his bunk. “Sure, but you’ve got to come to me.” 

Rolling his eyes, Stiles limps over. He wraps Jackson’s hand around his wrist, wincing only a little at the pressure. Jackson’s mouth is suddenly very dry, but he closes his eyes and does the thing he taught himself to do, pulling the pain from Stiles in ugly black lines. 

Tension leaves Stiles’ frame slowly. “Thanks,” he slurs, when Jackson finishes. He stumbles to his side of the room and does a sort of controlled collapse onto his futon. 

“Hey,” Stiles says. “There’s only like, 3 days of break left. You know what we should do?”

“What?” Jackson asks. 

“Get just like, absolutely trashed. We haven’t celebrated midterms yet, which is a tragedy, honestly.” 

“Sure,” Jackson agrees. “But it’s going to have to be tomorrow.”

He looks over at Stiles, but he’s already asleep. Tomorrow it is then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you here for the tags, next chapter, promise


End file.
